Unit 1: English In A MinuteGive us a minute and we'll give you English

Session 69

Welcome to English In A Minute. Give us a minute and we'll give you a hot tip about English. Grammar, vocabulary... there's so much to learn! And all taught by your favourite BBC Learning English presenter!

PhilHi, I'm Phil and I'm going to tell you about the difference between hard and hardly.

Hard we can use in lots of different ways but it usually means 'strong', 'difficult' or 'intense':Ow! That ball's hard!Calculus is hard!That was really hard work.

Hardly is an adverb and it can mean 'almost not'. This is too small. I can hardly read it.

We can use it with 'any' to talk about quantity. For example: There's hardly any water in this cup.

We can use it with 'ever' for frequency. For example: I hardly ever play basketball.

To help you remember:

It's hard for me to play tennis because I hardly ever train. I can hardly walk afterwards because I've been running hard. And I often get hurt because the ball's hard, and there's hardly any time to get out of the way!

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English In A Minute Quiz

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Which of these statements is true?

a'Hard' is an adverb but not an adjective.U29ycnkhIFlvdSBnZXQgaGFsZiBhIHBvaW50ISAnSGFyZGx5JyBpcyBhbiBhZHZlcmIsIGJ1dCBzbyBpcyBoYXJkIChldmVuIHRob3VnaCB3ZSBkb24ndCBtZW50aW9uIGl0IGluIHRoZSB2aWRlbyEgU3VycHJpc2UhKS4=

b'Hardly' is an adverb and an adjective.U29ycnkhIFlvdSBnZXQgaGFsZiBhIHBvaW50ISAnSGFyZGx5JyBpcyBhbiBhZHZlcmIsIGJ1dCBzbyBpcyAnaGFyZCcgKGV2ZW4gdGhvdWdoIHdlIGRvbid0IG1lbnRpb24gaXQgaW4gdGhlIHZpZGVvISBTdXJwcmlzZSEpLg==

c'Hard' and 'hardly' are both adverbs.V2VsbCBkb25lISAnSGFyZGx5JyBpcyBhbiBhZHZlcmIgYW5kICdoYXJkJyBjYW4gYmUgYW4gYWRqZWN0aXZlIG9yIGFuIGFkdmVyYi4=